Officially, heading into Game 7 in Oklahoma City Sunday, Anthony Gordon is listed as questionable. Denver coach David Adelman talked up how Gordon would go through the morning walkthrough with the team and would be a game-time decision.
Reality is Gordon has a Grade 2 hamstring strain and not only will he be out for Game 7 but he would need weeks to heal and would miss the Western Conference Finals if the Nuggets advance, reports Shams Charania of ESPN. The reality is he will be out closer to a month.
The latest update on Aaron Gordon is sadly a big one. A Grade 2 strain is often referred to as a partial or incomplete tear. Average time lost for G2 hamstring strains in the NBA is ~31 days (11.2 games). Gordon’s 2020 season also ended early following a strain of the same hammy.
Gordon strained his hamstring in the final minutes of the Nuggets’ Game 6 win on Thursday, going so far as to check himself out in the final minute. There was concern in Denver about the injury after the game, although Gordon said he would be okay, and he has searched for a way to be able to play Sunday. It just will not be possible.
Gordon has averaged 16.8 points and 7.3 rebounds a game while playing strong defense in these playoffs, and he hit the game-winning shot in Game 1.
NEW YORK — The end is never as fun as the start. And yet it just doesn’t seem right that the end was this unsightly.
When Brad Stevens built a championship roster, acquiring Kristaps Porzingis and Jrue Holiday after a disappointing early exit in the 2023 Eastern Conference Finals, we all knew there was a short window for this current group. The Celtics put together a historic season that culminated with Banner 18, then had maybe the quietest offseason in NBA history while deciding to basically run it back this year.
But the 2024-25 season ended badly. Boston never quite found the same mojo from a season ago, even while piling up 60-plus wins and showing glimpses of that title squad. The Celtics reverted to some bad habits — blown leads, turnovers, cold shooting — and couldn’t get out of their own way against the New York Knicks in Round 2 of the Eastern Conference semifinals.
What seemed so certain last summer is so very murky now. Tatum could miss the entirety of the 2025-26 season while rehabbing from Achilles surgery, as the Celtics have set no timetable on his return. A team hovering $20 million over the second apron must cut costs to ensure it can reliably chase titles deep into the future.
A new owner will take the reins during the offseason and hear some grumbles about Boston’s cost-cutting ways, even if it was inevitable regardless of who was writing the checks.
For the first time in years, it doesn’t feel like there’s an immediate pathway to Banner 19. The Celtics, depending exactly on what pieces return, will be too good to tank but not quite good enough to fully contend until Tatum is back at full health. What the roster will look like when that happens is truly a mystery.
Which left the Celtics in a weird spot after Friday’s Game 6 loss. Even with their long odds to advance, Boston players never fully entertained the idea that the end was near. After the lopsided loss, they were asked to reflect on the two-year run of this title core and ponder what might come next. Most players politely declined to do either.
They raved about the locker room. They admitted it wasn’t fun to think about the changes ahead. But they were still processing the reality. Jaylen Brown, who very well might be the central figure in a potential bridge season, tried his best to balance the emotions.
“Losing to the Knicks feels like death,” said Brown. “But I was always taught that there’s life after death. We’ll get ready for whatever is next. Whatever is next in the journey, I’ll be ready for.”
So what exactly comes next? We laid out the financial hurdles ahead in the aftermath of Tatum’s injury. The Celtics are committed to $228 million in contracts next season, already $20 million over the second apron, and that’s before decisions on free-agents-to-be in Al Horford and Luke Kornet.
Changes are inevitable. The difficult part is that there are no easy answers to trimming costs while trying to maintain talent around the desired core of this team. Celtics president of basketball operations Brad Stevens has the daunting task of figuring out how all these puzzle pieces fit together.
We feel pretty confident that next year’s roster will feature Tatum, as he rehabs, along with Derrick White, Payton Pritchard, Baylor Scheierman, and Jordan Walsh. We’re not sure anything else is certain.
Brown should be back as the focal point in the leading role. But the Celtics do have to at least consider all options to trim costs, and his $53.1 million salary — in Year 2 of a five-year, $286 million contract — is a gaudy number. Porzingis and Holiday were luxuries acquired to chase a title but their $30-plus million price tags could force the team to explore cheaper options at those spots.
Would a young team in need of a proven champ splurge to take on the three years and $104.4 million left on Holiday’s deal? What is Porzingis’ trade value after a mystery ailment sapped his energy at the finish line of the season?
Porzingis said he hopes a brief downturn in activity will jumpstart his body. He still hopes to compete in FIBA play with his native Latvia later this summer, which might offer answers to whether he’s able to reboot his body before the NBA season starts. He’ll have value as an expiring contract, but the Celtics would be rolling the dice a bit if they waited until next year’s trade deadline to potentially move off his money and his trade value feels diminished at the moment given his health woes.
Sam Hauser’s four-year, $45 million extension kicks in this summer. His 3-point shooting was vital in Boston’s title march, but the team might need to ride cheaper shooting threats if it can’t otherwise trim salary.
Does Horford, who will turn 39 next month, want to be back if Boston isn’t an immediate title threat? And at what price? Can the Celtics do some maneuvering to free up enough cash to reward backup big man Luke Kornet, who continues to blossom and came back on the cheap this season to keep the band together?
All decisions must be done through the lens of what puts this team in the best position to compete when Tatum is back on the floor. If Tatum misses all of next season, the calculus changes a little bit from whatever the team might have planned previously.
In Brad we trust. Stevens made the bold decisions to ship out core pieces in Marcus Smart and Robert Williams III in order to acquire Porzingis and Holiday. Even the most ardent Smart/Williams fans (this writer’s hand is raised high) can’t help but admit those deals elevated Boston’s ceiling and delivered the title that will cement the short legacy of this core.
Now Stevens has to do it again. The moves, in the moment, will almost certainly feel painful. But it also seems fair to suggest that Boston needed some tweaks after this season, particularly as familiar issues returned. The new acquisitions might not be as immediately talented as what goes out, but their fit and cost could aid this team in building the next version of a championship roster.
It’s unsavory that the collective bargaining agreement is what will prevent this team from trying to preserve more of the core moving forward. But it’s also the reality. The Celtics knew this crossroads was coming when they got ahead of the curve two summers ago. The interest on Banner 18 is coming due.
In this moment, everything feels uncertain. Which is simply jarring because everything felt so secure for the past 20 months. That’s life in the NBA. Things change quickly. You can’t sit around feeling sorry for yourself. You have to dust yourself off and put the focus on the next challenge.
All eyes turn to Stevens and his front office staff. Much like in the summer of 2023, they must work their magic.
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Lakers coach JJ Redick, left, and basketball executive Rob Pelinka enter an offseason with questions about the roster, including who will be the team's next big man. (Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
One year ago, the seats at the bar and the tables near the coffee shop inside the Marriott Marquis hotel and the seats and concourse in the adjoining Wintrust Arena were filled with people wondering what in the hell was going to be next for the Los Angeles Lakers.
The team had fired its coach, Darvin Ham, after a second consecutive first-round playoff loss to Denver and rumors were everywhere that the team had zeroed in on broadcaster JJ Redick. At the same time, LeBron James, his wife Savannah and their security team filed into the stands to watch Bronny James try to earn a spot in the NBA draft.
They were an inescapable topic of conversation, their position at the center of the NBA’s universe certainly annoying to the other 29 teams but inarguable.
This year, though, under those same roofs, the Lakers haven’t been the main event. They took their turn in the spotlight earlier this year when they traded for Luka Doncic. They’ve got their coach in Redick and Rob Pelinka has a promotion and a contract extension.
By NBA standards, they’re operating fairly status quo.
This week at the NBA draft combine in Chicago, people have buzzed about the 2025 draft class led by Duke’s Cooper Flagg, the kind of sure-thing prospect that eliminates any suspense. Winning the lottery, termed by multiple people as an “all-time” crazy one, could help undo some of the goodwill the Mavericks surrendered when they dealt Doncic to the Lakers.
There’s been a lot of speculation about Giannis Antetokounmpo and his future in Milwaukee and where Kevin Durant will land, assuming his time in Phoenix is over. People have started to speculate how Boston will approach a season without Jayson Tatum and the ripple effects of that.
But it’s the Lakers and something will eventually break through.
When people have wanted to gossip, they’ve pointed to the Lakers’ strength and conditioning job posting that somehow carried an ESPN segment on “Get Up” earlier this week. (According to people with knowledge of the situation, the team routinely posts jobs like this on LinkedIn and TeamWork online and did so last summer when they were hiring an assistant strength and conditioning coach.)
The method of the job posting, more than anything else, caught some people in Chicago off-guard — “We’d never post a job like that,” one rival team executive said — most people have lost the general thread, which is the Lakers trying to reimagine their strength and conditioning program.
The Lakers and strength coach Ed Streit parted ways last week, people with knowledge of the situation told The Times. Streit, a well-liked presence in the organization, joined the team in 2019 as an assistant strength coach and earned a promotion in 2021.
Following the season, though, Redick said he felt the team needed to be in “championship shape” next season. The Lakers’ two biggest stars, like most, work with their own strength and medical teams. Whoever joins the Lakers’ staff will be leaned on to help the rest of the roster, most notably Austin Reaves, who is set for free agency next summer and in line for a massive raise.
A new voice around the weight room could jolt the team as it tries to get to a different level with conditioning.
People, including the Lakers’ scouts and executives here in Chicago, have openly spoke about the team’s needs at the center position — an obvious priority for Pelinka and Redick.
The team has shown no interest in using Reaves in a trade that nets them anything less than a top-tier big, and there really aren’t any of those available, with the two most common names linked to them in the earliest stages of the offseason — Brooklyn’s Nic Claxton and Dallas’ Daniel Gafford.
Neither is a lock for a variety of reasons.
In Claxton, the Lakers would have the prototypical rim-protecting, lob-catching center that’s tailor-made for Doncic. Claxton's due more than $66 million over the next three seasons and is two years removed from his most impactful stretch as a pro when he averaged 12.6 points, 9.2 rebounds and 2.5 blocks on a league-best 70.5% shooting from the field. This season in 70 games, those numbers dipped to 10.3 points, 7.4 rebounds and j1.4 blocks with 56.3% shooting.
An optimistic read on the situation would point to the Nets’ losing as a reason for his dip in production. A pessimist would point to his narrow frame (just 215 pounds), the two straight years in which his numbers have slumped and the high salary.
Gafford, we know, is a surefire Doncic fit because of their time together in Dallas. He’s about to enter the final year of his deal and plays on a roster with Dereck Lively and Anthony Davis, making it unlikely that there’s more cash headed his way from the Mavericks.
The trouble, of course, is that people around the NBA wonder how it would look if Mavericks general manager Nico Harrison engaged Pelinka and the Lakers on another trade after the last deal between the teams was so unpopular that it caused protests.
All-Star guard Luka Doncic (77) and the Lakers need a big man with the departure of Anthony Davis in the trade. Will Austin Reaves or Dorian Finney-Smith be traded to acquire one? (Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
According to rival scouts and executives, the Lakers best’ assets (minus Reaves) are their 2031 first-round pick, second year wing Dalton Knecht and a bunch of expiring contracts. Some combination of them would be a must in any deal the team would make for a center.
The free-agency options, like the in-season trade options, are considered to be pretty lean. Indiana center Myles Turner is set to be a free agent, but he was already out of the Lakers’ price range before the Pacers' current run to the Eastern Conference finals. Brook Lopez is 37 and already had a one-year stint with the Lakers before leaving to play his best basketball elsewhere. Clint Capela could be an option depending on how the market reacts, but there are questions around the league about whether he’s still a full-time starter.
Jaxson Hayes, who started for the Lakers this season, is also a free agent, but the Lakers clearly had their doubts with him when they decided to bench him in the playoffs. You can assume that some bridges would need to be rebuilt if that were an option.
Another possibility or two could develop on draft night depending on how teams value this group of young bigs. A player such as Duke’s Khaman Maluach could be viewed as too good to pass up even if a team has a center on the roster, and that could create an opportunity for a player to unexpectedly hit the trade market.
Otherwise, the Lakers are looking for what every team in the NBA is looking for — versatility, toughness, athleticism and shooting.
Those markets are slowly starting to develop behind the scenes as agents meet with teams and as teams build out their offseason free-agency boards now that lottery has been settled.
The Lakers are working on all of this too. Just this time, it’s not what everyone is talking about.
But the Celtics still had a game to play Wednesday night. So on Tuesday, with a do-or-die Game 5 looming the following night at TD Garden, veterans Jaylen Brown and Al Horford decided to address the team to help shift the mindset.
“JB and Al talked to us, and they did a great job of really just understanding the situation,” Celtics big man Luke Kornet told reporters after Boston’s Game 5 rout of the Knicks. “Understanding that we have a game to play, and to go out and represent ourselves well and play hard — I feel like those two led the way in that.”
Kornet noted that Brown and Horford both acknowledged the harsh reality of Tatum’s injury — which could keep him out most if not all of the 2025-26 season — but urged their teammates not to give up the fight.
“I feel like they’re very aware of the situation, so there’s definitely a part of expressing that, and all of us kind of recognizing that and being in that,” Kornet added. “But at the same time, we do have an opportunity to move forward. We’ve just got to take it one game at a time, and the goal for today was just to make it back to New York.”
The Celtics succeeded in that goal, with Brown in particular leading the charge. The Celtics star delivered one of his best all-round performances of the season, tallying 26 points on 9-of-17 shooting (3-of-5 from 3-point range) along with eight rebounds and a playoff career-high 12 assists. Brown also played excellent defense on Knicks star Jalen Brunson, who fouled out early in the fourth quarter.
“Just come out and play,” Brown said of the message he delivered to the team. “Obviously, the air kind of left the room after hearing the news with JT. So, we didn’t want to go out like that.
“We didn’t want to make no excuses. We didn’t want to come out and give up or just turn the season in like what everybody else probably would expect. So we just said to the guys, said to each other, let’s come out, keep an open mind. Just come out and play basketball.
“Be ready to go and guard your ass off and take it from there.”
Brown has long embraced a leadership role on this team even with Tatum in the fold. But the last two days presented an opportunity for the nine-year veteran to step up even further in that department, and he rose to the challenge with both his words and his actions.
“We want to stay the course throughout the game, but when those two guys are at the front of it and lead you into it, it’s easy to just follow course and do the best you can,” Kornet added.
The Celtics still trail the Knicks 3-2 and will need to win Game 6 at Madison Square Garden on Friday to keep their season alive. But for one game at least, Brown and his teammates showed they still have some fight in them.
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It's Tuesday, May 13, and the Indiana Pacers (50-32) and Cleveland Cavaliers (64-18) are all set to square off from Rocket Arena in Cleveland for Game 5 of the Eastern Conference Semifinals.
Indiana is up 3-1 in the series after winning Game 4, 129-109. The Pacers were up by an NBA playoff record 41 points at halftime (80-39) before sitting the starters for most of the second half. Three different Pacers scored 20-plus points and seven different players scored double-figures.
The good news for the Cavaliers is that the series is back in Cleveland, but the bad news is they could be without their star and leading scorer, Donovan Mitchell. Mitchell is questionable for Game 5 after injuring his ankle and missing the second half. Darius Garland led the way with 21 points for Cleveland as no starter played more than 27 minutes.
The Pacers are currently 20-20 on the road with a point differential of 2, while the Cavaliers have a 7-3 record in their last ten games at home. We’ve got all the info and analysis you need to know ahead of the game, including the latest info on how to catch tipoff, odds, recent team performance, player stats, and of course, our predictions, picks & best bets for the game from our modeling tools and staff of experts.
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Game details & how to watch Pacers vs. Cavaliers live today
Date: Tuesday, May 13, 2025
Time: 7:00 PM EST
Site: Rocket Arena
City: Cleveland, OH
Network/Streaming: TNT / TruTV / Max
Never miss a second of the action and stay up to date with all the latest team stats and player news. Check out our day-by-day NBA schedule page, along with detailed matchup pages that update live in-game.
Game odds for Pacers vs. Cavaliers
The latest odds as of Tuesday:
Odds: Pacers (+246), Cavaliers (-306)
Spread: Cavaliers -7.5
Over/Under: 229 points
That gives the Pacers an implied team point total of 112.92, and the Cavaliers 116.83.
Want to know which sportsbook is offering the best lines for every game on the NBA calendar? Check out the NBC Sports’ Live Odds tool to get all the latest updated info from DraftKings, FanDuel, BetMGM & more!
Expert picks & predictions for Tuesday’s Pacers vs. Cavaliers game
NBC Sports Bet Best Bet
Vaughn Dalzell (@VmoneySports) likes Tyrese Haliburton Over 17.5 Points, plus leans the Game Under and the Pacers spread:
"After two straight Unders on his points prop. this may be a good spot to back the Over for Tyrese Haliburton. In Games 3 and 4, Haliburton scored 4 and 11 points compared to 22 and 19 in Games 1 and 2, so this is a buy-low spot as the Pacers head to Cleveland for a close-out. Haliburton has been clutch this series and postseason, so I expect a higher usage rate in a competitive game, leading to a good bet for the Over 17.5 points.
Games 5, 6, and 7 Game Total Unders in the second round and on are normally the best bets for a side or total and I tend to lean that way here. Indiana has taken advantage of an injured Cavs team all series long and with Mitchell questionable, I don't see why that doesn't happen again. With or without Mirchell, I think the points will be hard to come by tonight for Cleveland, so I lean the Pacers and the game Under."
Please bet responsibly. If you or someone you know has a gambling problem, call the National Gambling Helpline at 1-800-522-4700.
Our model calculates projections around each moneyline, spread and over/under bet for every game on the NBA calendar based on data points like recent performance, head-to-head player matchups, trends information and projected game totals.
Once the model is finished running, we put its projections next to the latest betting lines for the game to arrive at a relative confidence level for each wager.
Here are the best bets our model is projecting for today’s Pacers & Cavaliers game:
Moneyline: NBC Sports Bet is recommending a play on the Indiana Pacers on the Moneyline.
Spread: NBC Sports Bet is leaning towards a play ATS on the Indiana Pacers at +9.5.
Total: NBC Sports Bet is recommending a play on the under on the Game Total of 231.
Want even more NBA best bets and predictions from our expert staff & tools? Check out the Expert NBA Predictions pagefrom NBC Sports for money line, spread and over/under picks for every game on today’s calendar!
Important stats, trends & insights to know ahead of Pacers vs. Cavaliers on Tuesday
The Pacers are on a 4-game win streak at the Cavaliers
The Over is 4-1 in the Pacers' last 5 divisional matchups
The Cavaliers have covered in 11 of their 19 divisional matchups this season
The Pacers have won 4 of 5 games at divisional opponents
If you’re looking for more key trends and stats around the spread, moneyline and total for every single game on the schedule today, check out our NBA Top Trends tool on NBC Sports!
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- Jay Croucher (@croucherJD)
- Drew Dinsick (@whale_capper)
- Vaughn Dalzell (@VmoneySports)
- Brad Thomas (@MrBradThomas)
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Only one thing is certain heading into Monday night's 2025 NBA Draft Lottery: Whichever team lands the No. 1 pick will select Cooper Flagg. Following a standout season at Duke, Flagg is unquestionably on his own tier and on top of every team's draft board.
COOPER FLAGG JUST WENT COAST-TO-COAST AND POSTERIZED THE DEFENDER
But which NBA landing spot would be the best fit? What are the most interesting landing spots for Cooper Flagg? Let's break down the top landing spots (with their odds of landing the No. 1 pick).
San Antonio Spurs ( 6% chance)
This is the best basketball fit, probably what's best for Flagg in terms of his career — and would be totally unfair for the rest of the NBA.
Put Flagg next to Victor Wembanyama and the Spurs would have the best defensive front line in the league starting next season (sorry Cleveland), plus two bigs who are gifted passers as well as scorers. Add in De'Aaron Fox at the point, Rookie of the Year Stephon Castle, plus solid role players and this team is on a path to championships. Plural. It's easy to envision the Spurs as contenders within a couple of years.
It also seems fitting to place Flagg with the franchise that had the most success with a Twin Towers lineup in NBA history (David Robinson and Tim Duncan).
It would just suck for the 29 other teams.
Philadelphia 76ers (10.5% chance)
Philadelphia winning this lottery feels like the basketball gods letting the Sixers off the hook for the questionable decisions (and bad injury luck) that have them in the lottery in the first place.
However, pairing Flagg with Tyrese Maxey — especially with a healthy Jared McCain at shooting guard — would be dynamic. Just that young core could have the Sixers contending in a few years down the line, if the roster is built out right around them.
For the first couple of years, the 76ers would have Paul George and Joel Embiid on the roster, too, and if the stars align and everyone is healthy, that team could chase a ring. However, landing Flagg would give Daryl Morey a clear path to he future of the franchise and the ability to pivot away from Embiid and George if it comes to that.
Brooklyn Nets (9% chance)
How badly does the NBA want Flagg in the league's largest market?
It would also be a quality basketball fit because Brooklyn is well positioned to build a contender around Flagg: They have two other first-round picks in this draft alone, a number of future ones, and just four players under contract for next season. With that flexibility, the Nets could build quickly around Flagg with free agents and young players. Plus, if Giannis Antetokounmpo asks out of Milwaukee, and Brooklyn has Flagg, suddenly that looks like a much more desirable location for the Greek Freak.
Brooklyn also has a good coach in Jordi Fernandez, who kept getting the most out of players and winning despite management's best efforts to tear everything down around him. There are a lot of reasons to think Flagg would thrive in Brooklyn.
Houston Rockets (3.8%)
Houston winning would set the Phoenix Suns fanbase on fire — this is the Suns' pick, traded first to Brooklyn, then sent on to Houston (it is technically a swap, with the Rockets moving up to the lottery and the Nets getting the Rockets' No. 27 pick). After the season the Suns just had, to watch their pick go first to another team would be cruel.
Houston is a team stacked with athletic young talent: Amen Thompson, Alperen Sengun, Jalen Green, Jabari Smith Jr., Reed Sheppard, Tari Eason and more. Flagg would fit right in with his defense.
The playoffs showed Houston lacked an elite bucket getter in the half court and the clutch. Could Flagg be that guy? Maybe. Most importantly, this is a stacked roster with a lot of draft picks in the coming years, they are well positioned to build out a championship team around Flagg and their existing young core.
Portland Trail Blazers (3.7% chance)
As it showed in the final months of last season, Portland has some impressive young talent on the roster already: Scoot Henderson, Shaedon Sharpe, Toumani Camara, and Donovan Clingan, to name a few. Flagg would fit right in with this core — Camara and Flagg playing defense with Clingan as a backstop would be fearsome — and he could help spark their offense.
Portland also is a fan base that knows how to embrace their stars and make them at home, just ask Damian Lillard.
5. Utah Jazz (14% chance)
Of the three teams with a 14% chance at winning the lottery — the three worst teams in the league last season — this is the best landing spot for Flagg. That's because among the teams at the bottom of the league the Jazz have the best organizational foundation: Danny Ainge is an experienced head of basketball operations who knows how to build a winner, and they have a coach in Will Hardy who, even with the losses this season, drew the attention and respect of other teams for his player development and schemes.
Utah has the organizational foundation to build something impressive, they just need some luck to jump start the process. Like winning the NBA Draft Lottery.
from NBA Basketball News, Scores, Standings, Rumors, Fantasy Games https://ift.tt/yDj2q6k
Lakers guard Austin Reaves slaps hands with fans as he walks off the court after a defeating the Pacers at Crypto.com Arena. (Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
I love him like you love him.
But it’s time.
Austin Reaves is the Lakers' breath of fresh air, a sharpshooting respite from all the drama and dirge, a stirring journey from undrafted to indefatigable. My favorite, everybody’s favorite.
But it’s time.
If the Lakers are going to get where they need to be, they’ll have to get there without Austin Reaves. If the Lakers truly value the acquisition of a big man, they’re going to have to get rid of the little fella.
Send him packing in a deal that brings the Lakers the sort of lob partner and rim protector whose absence knocked you out of the postseason. Use him as the most attractive asset that could lure the sort of behemoth that could help this group bully their way back into contention.
You say you want to build around Luka Doncic? Start with uprooting Reaves.
You say you want LeBron James to have one more chance at glory before he retires? It’s never going to happen while running next to Reaves.
Six months ago, this whole idea was absurd. For a while last season, Reaves was the vital cog in a Lakers offense that transitioned from Anthony Davis to Doncic while maintaining Reaves' spot as a powerful No. 3 option.
He averaged a career-high 20 points, six assists and five rebounds. He made a team-high 73 starts. He was their leader in consistency and conscience, playing hard, playing hurt, always playing with intent.
Only 11 other NBA players averaged at least 20 points, 4.5 rebounds and 5.8 assists. And only three players on that list were younger than Reaves at age 26.
Lakers guard Austin Reaves drives to the basket against Wizards guard Bob Carrington during a game at Crypto.com Arena. (Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
He was the headband-wearing, scowl-showing oddball star of the show. He won the Christmas Day game with a last-second layup against Golden State. He scored 38 in a January win against Brooklyn. He scored 45 without Doncic or James in a February win against Indiana. He had 37 points and 13 assists in a shorthanded March loss in Denver that represented their most inspirational effort of the season.
By the end of the regular season he had moved from luxury to necessity, ballooning into the conversation as one of the Lakers Big Three untouchables.
Then, in five postseason game … Pop! … Psssst!
As the Lakers were losing four of five games to the Minnesota Timberwolves, Reaves was literally losing his footing with each dribble, struggling with a bruised toe and battered reputation.
He was lousy on offense, shooting barely 30% from deep. He was lousy on defense, constantly beaten by the Timberwolves’ more athletic backcourt. He was turned upside down by a physicality he could not match, and perhaps will never be able to match.
The moments when his best was required, he was at his worst. In every fourth quarter he disappeared as his team’s chance disappeared with him.
In the five fourth quarters he averaged three points. He scored one point in Game 3. He scored three points in Game 5.
In less than two weeks, he went from untouchable to untenable, and the new opinion on him is now clear.
If Austin Reaves is the Lakers’ third-best player, they’re going to have a difficult time winning a championship. If he’s in their Big 3, they don’t have a Big 3.
This is absolutely not to place the blame on Reaves for the loss to Minnesota. He was just a small part of everything that went wrong. But, unlike some diva stars from other losing teams, he boldly and publicly acknowledged his role in the carnage.
“Obviously I didn't have the series that I wanted to have,” Reaves told reporters in his exit interview after the playoff series. “You could point the finger at me. I really don't care. I wasn't good enough to help us be successful and I wish I could have done more, but I didn't. I struggled. You live and you learn.”
Problem is, he can’t learn to get taller, or learn to be more athletic, or learn to fit into an offense in which his strengths and weaknesses mirror those of Doncic, who needs a more complementary piece.
“... Quite frankly, nobody thought I was ever gonna be in this position,” he said. “So I've continued to prove myself over and over again. And, I'm gonna go to work and do the same thing next year. That's really it. I just needed to be better and I wasn't.”
That sort of honest introspection is just one reason why the Lakers players respect him as a locker-room leader and the Lakers' front office loves him as, among other things, a relatively inexpensive $14-million asset. And yeah, fans dearly want him to do well, and would love it if he stayed here forever.
Lakers forward Dorian Finney-Smith and guard Austin Reaves slap hands after Finney-Smith made a three-pointer against the Timberwolves during a playoff game in Minneapolis. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)
To be clear, the Lakers do not want to trade him, and there’s been no substantiated talk about trading him. James and Doncic do not want him gone. Around 19,000 at each home game do not want him gone.
But everybody knows the deal. To get something special, you’re going to have to give up something special.
If they have even a minuscule chance of acquiring Giannis Antetokounmpo, any deal would have to include Reaves. If they want Joel Embiid, Reaves has to go. They could probably get Nic Claxton without Reaves in the deal, but don’t they need to do better than Nic Claxton?
In his exit interview, basketball boss Rob Pelinka made it clear that he saw what everyone else saw when Minnesota’s Rudy Gobert suddenly became Wilt Chamberlain. They desperately need a center, and when the Lakers desperately need something, they will stop at nothing to get it.
“It would be great to have a center that was a vertical threat, lob threat, and someone that could protect the interior defensively, I think those would be key,” said Pelinka to reporters. “But there's multiple different types of centers that can be very effective in the league. There's also spread centers that can protect the rim. We'll look at those as well. So I wouldn't want to limit the archetype, but we know we need a big man.”
He pretty much covered every coveted big man in the league with that quote, didn’t he? Here’s guessing if the Lakers can get the right center, Reaves’ future here doesn’t stand a chance.
Not that the lack of size is the only large Laker problem going into the summer.
Despite all the Luuu-kaaa love, the Lakers also have a Doncic problem. As even the average fan could see, he needs to be in better shape. Minnesota players ran past him like he was standing still, which he usually was. He unofficially led the series in, “Out of breath.” It was so obvious, later coach JJ Redick appeared to direct criticism toward him when talking about what his team needs to do in the summer.
“I'll start with the … work that's required in an offseason to be in championship shape,” Redick said to reporters in a quote that will be repeated throughout training camp. “And we have a ways to go as a roster. And certainly, there are individuals that were in phenomenal shape. There's certainly other ones that could have been in better shape. That's where my mind goes immediately is we have to get in championship shape.”
Lakers guard Austin Reaves, center, has a similar skillset as All-Star teammate Luka Doncic (77), but the team really needs a big man to complement the starting five. (Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
Considering James is nightly lauded for being in “phenomenal” shape, one can only assume that Redick is pointing his “could have been in better shape” arrow directly at Doncic.
Will Luka listen? Will Luka change? Will Luka finally realize that his poor conditioning was his beloved Dallas Mavericks’ main reason for foolishly giving him away, and, while the Mavericks were robbed in the deal, all this talk of weight issues was absolutely true?
Doncic needs to shape up. And, addressing another Laker issue, Redick needs to shape up with him.
The coach had a rookie-of-the-year regular season, but, like his team, he melted down in the playoffs, absorbing public criticism from Magic Johnson after the first loss and then using the same five players the entire second half in their third loss. Before Game 5, Redick bristled at a reporter's question that implied he needs to rely more on his veteran assistants, and then walked out of the news conference with enough purpose that many in the national media gleefully reported that he stormed out.
For the record, he did not storm out. The news conference had reached its natural conclusion. He simply left after an angry response, but considering how much he had struggled in playoff games, folks assumed he was throwing a hissy fit.
He will learn from that moment and every awkward playoff moment that preceded it. He better learn. Darvin Ham was fired for much less.
"I know I can be better," Redick said. "I know I will … get better. I don't necessarily take any satisfaction from how the year went. That's not to say I'm not proud of what the group was able to do, and how we were able to figure things out on the fly, and put ourselves in a position to have home court in the first round, but there's always ways to get better and I can get a lot better."
Meanwhile, there’s only one reasonable way his team can get a lot better, quick, which brings this reluctantly penned column to its sorry completion.
I’ll hate, hate, hate saying farewell to Austin Reaves.
Ticket demand is so great for Saturday afternoon’s Game 3 of the NBA playoff series between the Boston Celtics and New York Knicks that the average paid ticket price on the resale market approached $2,000 Thursday.
The average was $1,956 for Game 3 and $1,716 for Game 4, both at Madison Square Garden, according to ticketing technology company Victory Live, which analyzes transactions, not listings, on the secondary market.
The cheapest ticket for Game 3 was $626 on StubHub; for Game 4 it was $613 on Vivid Seats.
The Knicks, eliminated in the conference semifinals the last two years, would reach the Eastern Conference Finals for the first time since 2000 if they win two more games against the Celtics.
Ticket prices for Knicks home games have surged steadily each day leading into Games 3 and 4. The average resale price last Friday was $767 for Game 3 and $545 for Game 4.
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Entering the second-round series in Boston, grabbing a split on the road in the first two games, and the Knicks steal homecourt advantage. Winning both games in dramatic fashion, with your opponent blowing 20-point leads in each of them for a 2-0 lead? Then you can start thinking about not having to return for Game 5.
“Going home and realizing the opportunity that we have, just gotta make sure we’re still locked in,” Jalen Brunson said after the Knicks’ 91-90 win over the Celtics in Game 2. “Know we’re close to being done, just make sure our mindset is the same.”
For Karl-Anthony Towns, who remembers taking a 2-0 lead at Denver last year with Minnesota in a series that eventually went seven games, the lead doesn’t amount to much.
“It means we up two zip, but it doesn’t really mean anything,” Towns said before mentioning the Nuggets won the next two games on the road to even the series. “We can’t take anything for granted, we gotta find ourselves executing at a higher level. We can’t keep doing these 20-point leads for Boston and hope to come back and win the game.
“We gotta play better, we gotta shoot better, we gotta execute better. We can’t start having that Knicks basketball being played down 20, we gotta start the game that way and finish the game that way.”
Before Game 2, head coach Tom Thibodeau said a “big challenge of the playoffs" is dealing with emotions and not looking past the next game.
“There are a lot of emotional highs, lows, and then the challenge is to reset the next day," he said. "And don’t get caught up in playing a series, you gotta focus on the task at hand, which is to win the game. Reset and focus on the things that you have to do to win that next game.”
"The jobs not done," Mitchell Robison, who was a team high plus-19 during 22 minutes Wednesday, said. "We just gonna leave it at that and continue to play basketball.
Boston’s Jaylen Brown, who scored 17 of his 20 points in Game 2 in the first half, said the defending champs “can get back in this thing no question.”
“Being down 0-2 it sucks, but we got a great group,” he said. “We just gotta come out, be a little bit more poised, take a deep breath, convert our opportunities – we missed layups, easy baskets – take advantage.
“Two games we were up 20 points somehow ended up not with wins. It’s inexcusable, but we gonna learn from it, we gonna respond.”
How are the Celtics planning on shaking off back-to-back blown big second-half leads? “In a way, it kinda takes all the pressure off of us, no?” KristapsPorzingis said. “If you check the odds, maybe the Knicks are the favorites now to win. Who knows?
"We were expected to win, so for us to be in this hole right now, with our backs against the wall, we have nothing to lose. We got to go out there and leave it all out on the floor."
Do the Celtics feel like they’re on the ropes?
“We’re definitely in a tough situation,” Porznigis said. “Down 2-0, but again, I’ve been in this situation on both sides, there’s a lot of basketball still to play, the momentum can change.”
Brown called it an “opportunity to show what we’re made of.”
“Not ideal situation being down 0-2,” he said. “But what’s done is done, we gotta make sure we’re ready to come out, make sure my guys are ready to come out Game 3. I think we due for a lot of makes. I think that we have a lot of great shots [Wednesday night] that didn’t go in.
“We just gotta relax, take a deep breath, come out and play Celtic basketball. Just like we down 0-2, we can tie this thing up.”
After shooting 25-for-100 from three and 29-for-93 after halftime in the first two games, Porzingis said the Celtics need to play with more “urgency.”
“It sucks really bad right now,” Porzingis said, “but we got a lot of basketball to play and let’s see where this goes.”
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The Denver Nuggets were pushed to a seventh game in the first round but shook off the ghosts of playoffs past to get the win. Their reward? Oklahoma City, 48 hours later. Here is everything you need to know.
When does the Nuggets vs. Thunder begin?
Denver travels to Oklahoma City for Game 1 of the series on Monday, May 5, with a 10:30 ET tip-off. This series plays every other day, up until a Game 7 when there would be a couple days of rest.
Denver vs. Oklahoma City Playoffs Schedule 2025
All times are Eastern (* = if necessary)
Game 1: Nuggets at Thunder (Mon. May 5, 9:30 ET, TNT)
Game 2: Nuggets at Thunder (Wed. May 7, 9:30 ET, TNT)
Game 3: Thunder at Nuggets (Fri. May 9, 10 ET, ESPN)
Game 4: Thunder at Nuggets (Sun. May 11, 3:30 ET, ABC)
Game 5: Nuggets at Thunder (Tues. May 13, TBD, TNT)*
Game 6: Thunder at Nuggets (Thurs. May 15, TBD, ESPN)*
Game 7: Nuggets at Thunder (Sun. May 18, TBD)*
Player to watch: Michael Porter Jr.
While he doesn’t qualify as a “headliner” in this series, Michael Porter Jr.’s productivity will be key for Denver to win this series. And he was productive against the Thunder during the regular season. In four meetings, he averaged 20.0 points, 9.0 rebounds, 1.8 assists and 3.8 three-pointers per game, shooting 45.3 percent from the field and 87.5 percent from the foul line. Interestingly, Porter shot far better on the road (54.8 percent) than at home (36.4 percent) in the regular-season series. He’s managed to play through his left shoulder injury and deserves credit. If Porter can be consistently productive as a scorer and rebounder, the Nuggets can pull the upset. —Raphielle Johnson, Rotoworld basketball analyst
Keys to watch for in Denver vs. Oklahoma City
1) Jamal Murray vs. Thunder perimeter defenders
Nikola Jokic will get his. While Mark Daigneault and crew will study Jeff Van Gundy’s solid game plans against Jokic from the first round — with Isaiah Hartenstein trying to fill the Ivica Zubac role — the simple fact is Jokic is the best basketball player on planet earth right now and there is only so much any human being can do.
However, for the Nuggets to have a chance in this series, they need 2023 Jamal Murray to show up. That peak Murray appeared in spots against the Clippers — such as Game 4, when he had 43 points and 7 assists — but he has not been around consistently all season (or in the last series). Now Murray is going to have to do it with Lu Dort, Jalen Williams, Alex Caruso and other elite defenders focused on him.
2) Can Denver survive the non-Jokic minutes
The Nuggets' long-running issues when Nikola Jokic is off the court are no secret, and that played out again this past regular season with Denver having a -8.3 net rating when Jokic sat. In the first round of the playoffs against the Clippers, that climbed to a -26.4 net rating without Jokic. The Thunder are better than the Clippers, and if Oklahoma City can dominate the non-Jokic minutes at the level Los Angeles did or more, it will dig too deep a hole for Denver, even if those non-Jokic minutes are limited.
3) Battle of the MVP candidates
At some point during this series, the NBA will announce the winner of the MVP award for this season, and Jokic and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander will finish 1-2, likely with Gilgeous-Alexander winning his first-ever award. That should light a fire under Jokic and the Nuggets.
As a side note, this could be a huge SGA series, the Nuggets don’t have a defender who can keep him out of the paint. While Denver will throw multiple players at SGA to slow him, that opens the door for Jalen Williams and others to step up for the Thunder. —Kurt Helin, NBC Sports lead NBA writer
Predictions
Jay Croucher (NBC Sports Lead Betting Analyst): Thunder in 6
With Christian Braun taking a leap and Jamal Murray healthier, this Nuggets team isn’t really any worse than last year’s team that entered the playoffs the clear favorite to win the West. Jokic provides the highest floor any offense can have, and Denver won’t be overwhelmed by OKC’s size.
But OKC are in a tier of their own in the West - the greatest net rating of all time speaks for itself. Expect Murray to struggle with the army of elite perimeter defender OKC can throw at him, and for the Nuggets to eventually run out of gas playing effectively a 6-man rotation.
Kurt Helin (NBC Sports lead NBA writer): Thunder in 5
There’s a segment of fans, as well as some scouts and front office people around the NBA, who still don’t believe in Oklahoma City as a contender. They see OKC as a regular-season team, not a playoff team, and think this is the series where OKC gets tested and probably exposed by a proven, championship squad. I say those people are about to eat… crow. The Thunder are real, they are deep, they defend at an elite level and can beat teams a lot of different ways.
I saw the Nuggets in person three times in the first round and came away thinking, “This is not a championship team this season.” Here is where Denver’s ride ends.
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After a hellacious first round against the Detroit Pistons, the Knicks are on to the Eastern Conference semifinals to take on the defending champion Boston Celtics.
New York, the lower seed, will start the best-of-seven series on the road. Here are the full dates and times for the Knicks' second-round series...
The Knicks' bench is thin. It’s a challenge the team has dealt with all year, as they finished last in bench scoring. The starting lineup played more than any five-man unit in the NBA during the regular season. The playoffs have only increased the burden on the starters. The Knicks bench averaged 11.5 points in New York’s six-game first round series win against the Detroit Pistons.
Heading into the team’s second round playoff matchup with the Boston Celtics, the club will need a bench player to step up and be an X-factor. That reserve has to be combo guard Miles McBride.
McBride’s playoff experience this year has been difficult. In the first round, he averaged just 3.8 points. The guard shot an ugly 26.7 percent from the field and 26.3 percent from behind the three-point line.
Creating depth off the bench has been a challenge for the Knicks in the playoffs, as only McBride and Mitchell Robinson averaged double figures in minutes. Cam Payne found a rhythm with 14 points in Game 1, but scored only eight combined points over the last five games.
Though McBride had a series to forget, he offers the Knicks solid two-way play on the floor that is needed in a series against an elite team in Boston. Despite standing just 6-foot-2, McBride has a near 6-foot-9 wingspan. He’s also a career 36 percent shooter from the three-point line.
The first round was a shocker. McBride has been productive and a quality rotation piece since the Knicks first transformed the roster and sent away Immanuel Quickley and RJ Barrett to the Toronto Raptors to acquire OG Anunoby. The Knicks’ sixth man this season, McBride was solid with 9.5 points in 24.9 minutes. In last year’s playoff run, he was a vital contributor, averaging 11.0 points on 43.5 percent from the field in 13 games.
McBride only averaged 16.0 minutes in the first round. But as the Knicks prepare for the Celtics, he should see a larger role. He has been an above average three-point shooter the last two seasons.
Making a positive impact
One issue for the Knicks will be getting up threes. Currently, New York is dead last in three-point attempts per 100 possessions among the 16 playoff teams. Against a Celtics club that had the highest three-point attempt rate in the regular season, the Knicks are going to need to let it fly. McBride leads the Knicks in three-point attempts per 36 minutes in the postseason. That could be crucial in helping push the team into more shots from long distance.
If the Knicks can create some opportunities in transition, that could be helpful to open up three-point looks for their shooters including McBride, who opens up different lineup options for the Knicks. This season, team’s have put their centers on Josh Hart while having a smaller player guard center Karl-Anthony Towns. The Celtics went to that strategy in all four regular season games.
If opponents play non-shooters on the perimeter, the Celtics have no problem putting big men like Kristaps Porzingis on them. Having a willing shooter in McBride is important for spacing on the floor to give Knicks stars Jalen Brunson and Towns room to operate.
Having McBride on the floor has usually worked for the Knicks. In 1,593 minutes, the Knicks were a plus 7.79 points per 100 possessions with him on the floor, according to PBP Stats. Even in his disappointing 96 minutes on the floor during the first round, the Knicks outscored the Pistons by 6.1 points per 100 possessions.
The Knicks are underdogs in this series. But if McBride can re-discover his outside shooting, it can give New York a boost off the bench and will provide the club with a better chance of competing with Boston.
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Greg Popovich's influence can be felt throughout the NBA. He was the first coach to lean hard into international players to build championship teams (Manu Ginobili, Tony Parker), he was the first coach to have a woman assistant coach on his bench (Becky Hammond), and the branches of his coaching tree spread throughout the league. More than that, he impacted the league by focusing on the player as a person and pushing a life/work balance not always common in the world of professional sports. He was respected and loved not just by the Hall of Famers he coached — David Robinson, Tim Duncan, Pau Gasol, and others — but by players around the league such as LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Stephen Curry, and the late Kobe Bryant.
When he announced Friday that at age 76 he was stepping away from coaching and moving full time into the Spurs front office, the reactions poured in, starting with the Spurs current star, Victor Wembanyama.
29 years.
Coach, thank you for your wisdom, for your leadership, for the culture you created…
But most importantly for being a great and inspiring person.
It was an honor to be a part of those 29 years Wishing you the best on your new chapter.
Plenty of other players also posted tributes to Popovich on social media — as did Lil' Wayne.
Congrats on the career Coach Pop!!
Flowers!! I’ve observed your approach to coaching and to the game and I applied the same approach to life at times and came out a winner every time. Thx Coach! I just might have to Popavich! Shut yo mouth. I’m just talmbout Pop!
If the NBA’s ownership class remains justifiably delighted about the league’s new $76 billionrights package, that’s not to say that sacrifices weren’t made in order to secure what amounts to a compound annual growth rate of 8% and an 11-year stretch of guaranteed stability. As New York Knicks owner James Dolan memorably groused last summer in a memo to the NBA’s board of governors, the terms of the new national media deal threaten to make a hash of the legacy RSN model.
In adding a second broadcast partner and thereby increasing the volume of regular-season games that will air nationally—with NBC set to suit up for the first time since 2002, the number of over-the-air NBA games will increase from 20 this season to approximately 75 in 2025-26—the league has had to pull a corresponding chunk of inventory from the RSNs.
As Dolan wrote last summer, “The increased number of exclusive and non-exclusive games means that national partners would have the ability to air nearly half of the regular season and all postseason games.” The owner went on to predict that the subsequent “reduction in available games for RSNs risks rendering the entire RSN model unviable.”
Dolan’s discomfiture is understandable, as cord-cutting was already doing a number on the legacy RSN model well before the NBA began beefing up its national TV slate at the expense of the local sports channels. Between 2019 and 2024, the RSNs formerly housed under the Diamond Sports Group banner lost as many as 25 million subscribers, and with an annual churn rate of 12%, the traditional cable/satellite/telco-TV bundle is shrinking like a salted slug.
For all that, the volume of regular-season games that will be lost to the national media partners starting next year isn’t expected to be unmanageably disruptive. “Once the schedules are released, we expect that the average team will lose about three games, which is hardly debilitating,” Playfly Sports CEO Craig Sloan said during a recent Zoom call. (Playfly sells NBA, MLB and NHL ad inventory across the RSNs.) “Some teams will have zero disruption, and others will have a bit more, but they should on average be about three per club, is our understanding.”
Sloan credited Adam Silver for his judicious approach to kicking inventory upstairs, saying that the NBA commissioner “managed to manufacture that without having to degrade any significant value from the local media side.” More to the point, the reduction in the number of games carried in the home markets isn’t expected to be sufficient to trigger any complaints from pay-TV operators, which are guaranteed a set number of games under the terms of their various carriage deals.
Nor are fans likely to notice the reduction of in-market offerings, although your milage may vary depending on which team you root for. Big-market RSNs linked to high-value franchises will be more susceptible to losing games than low-profile clubs based in second- and third-tier DMAs.
Where the RSNs can expect to get dinged is during the first round of the NBA playoffs, which for decades has functioned as a shared space. Starting next season, the first eight best-of-seven series will no longer be available on the respective local platforms, as the league’s national media partners will assume full control of the round. And while it remains to be seen what sort of impact the end of “side-by-side” local/national coverage will have on the Nielsen ratings, the contributions of those in-market channels are significant. On average, the RSNs and other local TV outlets contribute as much as 40% of each first-round games’ overall deliveries.
Sloan concedes that the loss of those playoff games will have an impact, as postseason inventory “is a helpful driver for regular-season ad sales.” In other words, marketers who want to take advantage of the big playoff ratings are generally required to purchase regular-season inventory, although that’s not to say that the premium units are deployed as a cudgel to move the more quotidian spots.
The loss of all that early playoff inventory will be marked by a concomitant reduction in ad sales revenue, although not so much as to put anyone in the poor house. “There’s so much volume in the regular season that there’s actually not going to be a dramatic reduction in overall revenue,” Sloan said. “It will equate to a high-single-digit percentage of our total NBA dollars. And of that, it’ll be interesting to see how much we can replace next season with incentives.” As such, fans may notice an uptick in experimental/non-traditional ad formats and other on-screen premiums when the 2025-26 NBA season tips off in October.
While Sloan did not volunteer a hard dollar amount, a little back-of-the-envelope math based on legal filings and other financial documentation suggests that the RSNs and other in-market platforms may expect to lose a grand total of $60 million in ad revenue next season. A good chunk of that sum should be recoupable during the regular season.
That said, the loss of the local connection that’s forged season after season could have a bit of a chilling effect on the NBA’s national ratings during next year’s opening round. When markets like Boston and New York are in play, in-market deliveries can account for nearly half of all the impressions that are credited to the national media partners. As such, it’ll be well worth keeping an eye on the first-round playoff ratings in 2026. As Playfly head of research Gregg Liebman notes, “first-round viewership is largely driven by the home-team fans, and it’s not until the later rounds, the Eastern and Western Conference Finals, that the more casual fans start coming in.”
If you’re a Knicks fan, this all means that you’re going to have to steel yourself for a postseason devoid of the stylin’ and profilin’ of MSG’s Walt Frazier. Clyde has said that he’ll be devastated to leave his playoff booth duties behind, and local Knicks supporters who hang on his every word for six months each year are equally bummed at the prospect. (Meanwhile, Frazier’s boss now has a lot more to worry about than a handful of games that must be surrendered to ABC and NBC; as part of a bid to restructure MSG’s debt, the Knicks owner last week agreed to a 28% rights-fee haircut, with the team’s media dollars next season set to shrink from a planned-for $148 million to about $106 million.)
If the absence of Clyde promises to take some of the fun out of the Knicks’ future playoff runs, the ramifications of the NBA’s new media deal will resonate far beyond New York. “Certainly, you lose that affinity component in the local home market,” Sloan said. “I think the fans are going to miss that local voice, even with all the drama that happens in the playoffs. To lose out on that familiarity is a real miss.”
The Dallas Mavericks general manager may have been watching from home, but his thought process about trading Luka Doncic came to the spotlight.
Doncic, in particular, struggled to impose himself defensively despite posting strong offensive numbers. The Los Angeles Lakers also saw their lack of depth play a factor, as the five starters accumulated heavy minutes to compensate for a feeble bench.
Los Angeles worked its way up the Western Conference ladder to the No. 3 seed following the Doncic trade, but playoffs expose team’s weaknesses. The No. 6-seeded Minnesota Timberwolves delivered when it mattered, with Julius Randle also enjoying a solid series given his past woes.
The first postseason of the LeBron James-Doncic era ends in early failure, with Rob Pelinka having more work to do as James turns 41 next season.
Here’s how social media reacted to the Lakers’ elimination, which included the Mavericks’ GM:
Nico Harrison was right he just didn't piece together the proper trade package
Nico Harrison ain’t going to sleep tonight until somebody crunches the numbers and posts the total points Luka scored vs total points he gave up as the the primary defender this series
— ✨🦫America Is Musty🦫✨ (@DragonflyJonez) May 1, 2025
Anthony Edwards last three series wins:
— Knocked out Luka and LeBron
— Knocked out Jokic and Murray
— Knocked out KD and Book
Luka is my favorite player, but idk how you don’t do some deep soul searching after this offseason. He’s going to need to lock competely in and hopefully this is the offseason that ultimately changes his career for the better
